Batman: Echo
by BatmanEcho
Summary: Bruce Wayne can no longer hold the mantle of Batman. Years of abuse means he can no longer protect Gotham alone. He fakes his death, goes into hiding and starts a league of Batmen to keep Gotham safe. They operate in pure secrecy to ensure that Batman's death remains true to the public so that batman can truly be a symbol to inspire actions of the everyman to keep Gotham safe.


A flash of lightning cut through the night sky, in the darkness a series of shadowy figures could be seen upon the rooftops. A second flash of lightning showed these shadows to be in a strange sort of dance. Initially there were five figures in the darkness, however, another flash of lightning seemed to remove one of the figures from the scene. The rooftop dance soon turned into a chase and with subsequent flashes of light another figure was missing until only two remained. With impressive agility the figures jumped across the rooftops until with a final flash of lightning they were gone and the city settled back into normality.

A loud crash followed by the cracking of thunder sent two men flying through a window, they hit the ground with a wet thud. The rain had soaked them to the bone as they struggled to their feet on the now slippery tiled floor. The darkness of the night outside was only just kept at bay by the lone light bulb hanging in the dingy corridor. The first of the two men to crash through the window suddenly drew a gun and dropped to one knee to steady his aim at the window. The second man hid behind the first around a corner. "Did we lose him?" he whispered sheepishly down to his friend.

A gruff voice then called out from the darkness beyond the window. "No" Suddenly the light bulb burst and the hallway was flooded with darkness and what looked like a monster climbed through the window. The man with the gun began to fire and the muzzle flashes revealed details of the creature closing in on them. His body was large and grey, he had sharp, pointed ears on top of his head. His eyes shone white in the darkness and finally there was a large symbol emblazoned on his chest, a black bat. The gun was soon empty and it appeared that despite the tight spacing of the corridor the creature had not been hit by a single bullet. Without the gun to keep them safe the two men now began to run, unfortunately for the first man he was too close to the creature and was sucked into the darkness. With a loud thud and the breaking of the tiles the first man was now unconscious.

Leaving his friend to his fate the second man was frantically making his way down the stairs in an effort to break onto the streets where he could find a car and make his getaway. Unfortunately for him however he had only made it down a single flight of stairs before the creature with the bat on his chest descended upon him. It seemed almost as if the creature could fly with his all-encompassing black cape flowing behind him as he jumped down the stairs to attack his prey. With a bone shattering kick the creature sent the man flying down the corridor and was quickly on top of him. One knee digging into his chest and the other on the ground he leaned over the man and pulled him close. "You're done dealing, got it?" With the same gruff intensity, the creature almost growled at the man on the ground. Unable to respond with more than a whimper, the man on the ground simply nodded in answer to the beast above him. "Good" and with that a fist firmly found itself on the jaw of the man knocking him unconscious.

The large creature slowly rose to his feet and started to walk away when he heard a woman call out from the floor below. "Up here officer, I heard the gunshots coming from upstairs." Footsteps clambering to the top of the stairs sent the creature running. By the time he reached the top of the stairs all the police officer saw was a black mass disappearing into the night. He ran over to check on the unconscious man all the while looking out into the darkness wondering what he had just seen. What he had just seen… was The Batman.

" _The Batman needs to be an idea, a myth, a symbol. He needs to be a name talked about in hushed whispers down dark alleys, but I lost sight of that. The Batman became real, he was a man, a man that could bleed, a man that could die. To truly save Gotham, The Dark Knight needed to die, he needed to vanish so that the myth could live, stronger and more powerful, and the underworld could cower in fear at the night._ " – Bruce Wayne.


End file.
